And then there was a blood-curdling scream. Ken Ueno’s Talus, featuring violist Wendy Richman, received a few laughs after its over-the-top, horror-flick beginning but quickly demanded complete silence and deliberation from the audience as the piece slowly unfolded from pitch-less textures to rich atmospheres of complex and beautiful sounds. The piece demanded extraordinary control over extended techniques of the soloist as well as the supporting string orchestra. While the vocalizations - both jarring in the beginning and, more subtly, within the textures later in the piece - may have come off as extremist, even gimmicky, one cannot deny that Talus was the most memorable piece of the evening.

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